Ashtanga Yoga benefits – Discovering Healthier Body and Mind

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November 2, 2015

Ashtanga yoga is the powerful yoga with immense benefits and is known to increase your stamina and strength. This yoga was standardized by an ancient sage Patanjali and was found by K. Pattabhi Jois . As the name shows, it is mainly the royal eightfold yoga and it is commonly used by sportsman, athletes and others who are interested in increasing stamina and strength quickly. This is yoga is extremely beneficial for youngsters and puts extra emphasis on emphasizes on flexibility, relaxation and breathing. Ashtanga yoga can be called as the yoga of techniques as there are number of techniques such as different postures, breathing activities, concentration, various exercises and meditation is involved in this. The various postures in this yoga have higher degree of difficulty when compared to other styles. The main purpose of Ashtanga yoga is providing various benefits like improving the overall health of a person that includes physical, mental and emotional benefits.

Know more about the benefits of Ashtanga Yoga:

Physical Benefits: The major physical benefits include keeping your body free from diseases, increasing the overall immunity and make the body light and strong. With its immense benefits the major one is that this yoga makes the body absorb and retain prana and thus increasing the life span. It makes the body more active and also enhances the stamina and strength of the body.

Emotional benefits: This yoga is very good for keeping you in better mental state. Once you start practicing this yoga you will no more be the slave of your emotions but will definitely help you become a better observer. Usually an emotion causes many suffering and start affecting the health in adverse manner. At one point of time the emotions become uncontrollable and unbearable and often results in negativity and depressions. There is a major difference between emotion and feeling. Emotion is usually related to the past and on the other hand feeling is a real and genuine consciousness that arises in the present moment. Practicing the Ashtanga yoga removes the layers of past and makes you feel more deeply and much happier.

Mental benefits: Human mind according to yoga is considered as a computer that analysis the sensory data. Understanding the complete programming of human is not as easy thing to understand as it handles and plans objects cognized in the past onto a present object that needs to be identified. The mind has the power to recollect all the previously cognized objects and this is why it is considered as the major part of the body. Practicing Ashtanga Yoga makes your mind peaceful and brings clarity in your thoughts.

How is Ashtanga Yoga Practiced

Unlike most of the yoga, Ashtanga Yoga is not static but it is dynamic and breathing is its essential. The fluctuating, pulsating or oscillating of breath goes simultaneously along with the movements of the mind. Various postures basically energize all the parts of your body. In this process breathe is spread in all parts of the body thus reducing the risk of chronic diseases. In Ashtanga yoga both the abdomen and the thorax are used to breathe which is also known as thoraco-diaphragmatic breathing. While breathing, the air is perfectly pumped out the lungs and this in turn increases your vitality and strength. The right process of doing this is not to inhale as much as possible but initially to exhale fully so that space can be created for new inhalation. By increasing the exhalation process the overall amount of oxygen supply is increased. The increased exhalation exhales toxins from the body; including emotional, mental, emotional and environmental toxins. The deep breathing process exhales the toxins from the body and allows you to inhale more oxygen and thus letting your body to return to original state of health.

Ashtanga Yoga should be practiced by whom?

The major benefit of Ashtanga Yoga is to provide strength and stamina to the body and thus it is mainly recommended to people with proper and decent shape. Being a beginner you should avoid this as this type of exercises as even the easiest poses in this yoga can be very difficult and demanding. For practicing Ashtanga yoga you should start it doing it slowly and once you master all the postures then you will definitely experience better strength and stamina and feel that you are body is even more flexible. This is the reason why this yoga is mainly practiced by athletes and sportsmen.

Once you have decided that you want to try out your luck in this exercise then you will definitely see the signs of improvements and gradually feel mentally and physically even more fit. Initially your trainer may ask you to practice a series of basic poses and once he/she feels that you have now mastered the basic poses then only you will be allowed to practice the next series of poses that are a bit more difficult.

Poses in Ashtanga Yoga

Speaking about the poses in Ashtanga Yoga, it has various positioning and poses included in it. The different poses that this yoga has include moving from inverted, sitting, back bent, standing and also a few twisted postures.
All the poses are mainly designed to provide strength, stamina and flexibility. Thus start practicing it and experience the immense of benefits of Ashtanga Yoga!